Challenge #30 - TBL - Discussion Thread

[TimHorton]

So far halfway through it has been a rollercoaster ride. First 20 games were miserable putting up only 7 wins, 12% PP, and 68% PK. Ouch. Filpula missed a month but he was the only cause to blame.

For the next 20 games I decided to put Helenius in goal, instead of Lindback, who played surprisingly well except for a few 5 goal games. This allowed 12 wins and somehow upped my PP to 18%. I am glad to be doing better but still not in a playoff spot so I don't think I will make it.

[mrballar]

I was a little bit ticked that I had to restart my game after spending so much time setting up line and individual tactics but I had a few things that seemed to help out of the gate.

1.) Hired Bobby Carpenter and Mark Pederson as Assistant Coaches and reassigned Gwozdecky to scout opposition. Apparently having these two guys on as assistant coaches made a decent difference.

2.) JesterX posted about switching around guys to see if Stamkos made the line or if the pairing with St. Louis was the dealmaker. I started my top two lines as Paradis - Stamkos - Purcell and Malone - Filppula - St. Louis. Filppula seemed to produce better with St. Louis but after going 5-5-0 to start, I moved St. Louis back to 1st line with Stamkos and the two seem to feed of each other quite well. 2nd line seems to produce quite consistently with Purcell on RW.

3.) This is my first challenge and I absolutely love it so far because it's forced me to really consider line/individual tactics and line pairings. I seem to find a 1v4, 2v1, 3v2, 4v3 line matchup to be quite effective to start the period. I usually move into a 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 4v4 pairing in the 2nd and 3rd and usually switch over to Two Only settings for forwards and defensemen in the 3rd (depending on goal situation). That seems to secure solid scoring in the first period and some nice stat padding at the end.

4.) Based on the law of averages, I'd have to assume I'll dip back down with a losing streak after going 9-1-0 in my last 10. The sixth game into the streak the media was busy mocking my playoff chances, so we'll see what plays out during the rest of the season.

Anyone had any luck with Syracuse (as a tangent topic here)? Helenius has done quite well for AHL and they've been bouncing between 1st and 2nd in the standings.

[jesterx7769]

Anyone had any luck with Syracuse (as a tangent topic here)? Helenius has done quite well for AHL and they've been bouncing between 1st and 2nd in the standings.

I think I said earlier I made another GM to run Syracuse for mainly practice/line management reasons. In the first season they made it to the conference finals in playoffs which was good with Helenius doing well. I saw some people started Helenius at the NHL which I may have to do since I did not sign a new goalie. The only real move I made in the AHL team is buying Ryan O'Marra in order to help win some more games for me to keep morale up.

[mrballar]

I think I said earlier I made another GM to run Syracuse for mainly practice/line management reasons. In the first season they made it to the conference finals in playoffs which was good with Helenius doing well. I saw some people started Helenius at the NHL which I may have to do since I did not sign a new goalie. The only real move I made in the AHL team is buying Ryan O'Marra in order to help win some more games for me to keep morale up.

I brought Helenius up into the NHL permanently about half-way through the season and placed on of the goalies from the affiliates in the AHL. Lindback had frequent injuries and I couldn't get avoid getting scored on fewer than 5 times a game with Bishop in net (not even Stamkos and St. Louis could bring me back from those deficits). I'm finding the biggest issues to be the need to patch the 3rd & 4th line guys with the not-so-good AHLers, which is something I hope to build on in the offseason. Had a string of injuries from Stamkos, St. Louis and Purcell that absolutely devistated the scoring. Can't seem to get them to click again now that they're all back again.

[jesterx7769]

Forgot to mention Namestinkov (sp) did well for me in the AHL and I may bring him up for this second season. Otherwise no one really lit it up, Killorn was a disappointment.

[bruins72]

Ugh! This long Olympic break is taking me so long to get through!

It seems like the other teams are going crazy looking for trades during this break. For some reason, the Bruins haven't been doing so well and once that happens, their team begins to get picked apart. I've been seeing MANY offers for Chara and Eriksson. They've also traded away Kelly and Seidenberg during the Olympic break and got lousy returns, almost looking like salary dumps. This always seems to happen with them.

[jesterx7769]

Yeah the Olympic break was kinda weird and a lot of click, click, click. However St. Louis got injured right before it for a few weeks so thanks to it he didn't miss a game for me

[bruins72]

I had Hedman get injured in Sweden's last game of the Olympics. Then I had 4 games in 5 days following the Olympics and was without him.

[mrballar]

Anyone into the second season have issues resigning expiring UFAs? Couldn't get half the guys to stick around, so had to start from scratch Started season 2-9 and Stamkos doesn't seem to want to score at all.

[jesterx7769]

I started signing all my guys right away at the first contract warning. You end up overpaying for guys you don't really want but I learned early on in challenges you can't take that risk. Is Salo really worth his $2.5m? Of course not. But if you don't keep him you have to use an AHL quality guy. Since you aren't adding a lot of salaries in challenges you should not really have issues staying under the cap unless you are trading for people with big salaries.

[bruins72]

I do the same as Jester. I start signing guys when I get that news item about expiring contracts. I'll increase the p/a offer for a lot of guys too and then as for another year out of them. I figure it will save me some money in the long run. It will at least save me from dealing with contracts so soon again.

[Stastny26]

I was fired after 30 games (12-14-4) in the second season...

P.S. Lundqvist made 18 shutouts in season 13-14 - no comments...

[mrballar]

I was fired after 30 games (12-14-4) in the second season...

P.S. Lundqvist made 18 shutouts in season 13-14 - no comments...

Yikes, I have a record far worse than that, I'm surprised I'm still GM, lol.

Out of curiosity, who did everyone pick up in their trades and UFA signings/waiver acquisition in the off-season (for those who've hit that point), and were they worthwhile pickups or a bust?

I grabbed Vokoun for $720k in what I thought was a steal. After I released Bishop I thought he might turn out to be better than Lindback, which he did, but not as much as I thought, so success in that I essentially swapped similar tenders for less than half the price. Also picked up Andrei Markov, he's been run of the mill, but allowed me to ship a rookie back to the AHL at least, paying him about $1.13M.

Also picked up Tyler Kennedy in a trade for Richard Panik, to which I am quite certain I was the victor on that one. And also grabbed Marcus Foligno on a trade for my 3rd round pick of 2015. He's my top scorer as of now, which is good for immediate results but considering I tanked this season, the pick might have been more worthwhile with a trade for a future pick.

[bruins72]

I was fired after 30 games (12-14-4) in the second season...

P.S. Lundqvist made 18 shutouts in season 13-14 - no comments...

Don't forget... you can add yourself back in to take over the team again.

[bruins72]

Also picked up Tyler Kennedy in a trade for Richard Panik, to which I am quite certain I was the victor on that one. And also grabbed Marcus Foligno on a trade for my 3rd round pick of 2015. He's my top scorer as of now, which is good for immediate results but considering I tanked this season, the pick might have been more worthwhile with a trade for a future pick.

Your Marcus Foligno trade isn't in accordance with the rules. The pick for player trade is supposed to be for a veteran.

6.11 You may now make a maximum of two trades per season.

One straight up 1-for-1 deal is allowed. You may send one player out and you may accept one player in return. Nothing more.

AND

One player for pick or pick for player deal is allowed. In an effort to rebuild through the draft, you may trade an older player (aged 33 or older) for a draft pick (no better than a 2nd round pick). Alternatively, to strengthen your team through veteran talent, you may trade a draft pick (no better than a 2nd round pick) for a veteran player (aged 30 or older). You may only do one of these deals involving a pick each season.

Foligno isn't 30 years old or over.

Do you have a save from before the trade?

[mrballar]

rubbish, yes I do
For some reason I completely forgot about the 30 yr. part of the trade rule. Can I have my season 2 stats reset?

[bruins72]

I'll PM Archi to ask him to reset season 2 for you.

[jesterx7769]

Callahan is the only player I added so far for season 2. Since I was having a hard time trying to trade for someone actually decent I decided to wait and hope for one of those fire sales.

[mrballar]

Thanks for the reset and heads up on the trade rule, Bruins72!

Think ive finally got all the nuances of the challenge down now.

[mrballar]

Ended season 2 in last place for both TB and Syracuse. I think my game's broken, not only did I not lose my job(s), the board of directors are pleased with my performance. Here's to next season

[Leeman14]

Season Two for my Lightning team has been tough. They don't seem to have much of an identity although my UFA signing seems to be my most consistent player--Jonathan Ericsson. I'm in Q4 and have so far traded out Ryan Malone to Anaheim for a 2nd Round Pick (he's over 33 and was grossly overpaid and underperforming) and I also made a 1-for-1 deal by flipping Ben Bishop to Detroit for Teemu Pulkkinen.

I'm hoping Season 3 is better with some young blood in Drouin, Erne and Jared McCann. I'll also be hunting for a #1 goalie in Season 3's UFA pile.

[jesterx7769]

Ended season 2 in last place for both TB and Syracuse. I think my game's broken, not only did I not lose my job(s), the board of directors are pleased with my performance. Here's to next season

That's weird. Did you have lots of injuries or something? Even in season 1 the team should finish nowhere close to last place barring injuries.

[Leeman14]

Ended season 2 in last place for both TB and Syracuse. I think my game's broken, not only did I not lose my job(s), the board of directors are pleased with my performance. Here's to next season

That's weird. Did you have lots of injuries or something? Even in season 1 the team should finish nowhere close to last place barring injuries.

Anything's possible, really. When I lost Filppula for 4 months and Stamkos for 1 month, I was certain I'd finish last but Teddy Purcell really performed well through the stretch despite his AHL linemates.

[mrballar]

Goaltending was a huge issue I think. I've been adjusting tactics the whole season but just couldn't figure out a way to stop the goals from pouring in. I'd score an average of 2-3 points a game, but it was as if the team choked and gave up too many goals at the end of each game. I had picked up Vokoun as a UFA who I was using as a starter with Helenius, but Vokous had a severe MCL injury that put him out for 8 months about February. Before then I was riding .500, tanked after that. I did have some injuries here and there with Stamkos and St. Louis, they just never seemed to click after January for some reason. They tore it up in the 1st season. The only positive thing I can say is that the other lines seem to produce consistently with the top line so there is scoring, but I was hoping to see the team shift to a balanced offense/defense and not just a scoring powerhouse at they were built in the first season. I'm hoping I can land a decent goaltender in UFA this time around, there are a few decent tenders who have their contracts expiring.

[TimHorton]

I was actually quite pleased with my offseason additions even if they aren't very sexy.

I signed Corey Crawford as my UFA. He isn't a top 10 goalie but I am hoping he makes enough of a difference. Traded player pick for Jeff Peltry who isn't a known stud but has great all around attributes. Traded third round pick for Matt Cooke who should help out on penalty kill and a defensive perspective quite nice. I drafted Lazarev in the first round who has great attributes and I am keeping up on NHL level for his first 20 games to see how he does. No one has mentioned him yet but I signed Kazionov who the Lightning had rights to. He isn't a top two liner but he a most improvement over the bottom forwards from before. So we will see what happens, my goals are to get past first round of the playoffs and let in 20 less goals.